Social media-
Michael– https://www.facebook.com/michael.gerard.9883
Angela– https://www.facebook.com/angela.pollina.5
Justyna’s– https://www.facebook.com/justina.valva.3
Justyna’s Twitter, where she documented the abuse: https://twitter.com/JustZub
(legally name is spelt Justyna but it seems in her day to day life she uses Justina, so it will change throughout but it is the same person)
Center Moriches, LI, NY – Friday, January 17th, 2020, Suffolk County Police were called to the Bittersweet Lane home of NYPD Transit officer Michael Valva (40) for a report of an 8 year old boy who “fell in the driveway” and was unconscious. Thomas Valva, Valva’s autistic son, was rushed to an area hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
The following Friday, January 24th, Valva and his fiancée, Angela Pollino (42) were arrested and charged with 2nd Degree murder for Thomas’ death. Later that day, Suffolk County Police Commissioner Geraldine Hart held a press conference, detailing what really happened to 8 year old Thomas.
· The child was left in the garage overnight and died of hypothermia. The temperature outside that night was only 19° F (-7° C).
· His body temperature when he arrived at the hospital was 76° F (24° C).
· The investigation revealed inconsistencies in timing and nature of the child’s injuries as reported by the father.
· When police arrived, Michael Valva was performing CPR on his son, in the home’s basement.
· The medical examiner ruled the boy’s death a homicide with a major contributing factor of hypothermia.
· “We believe certainly that Thomas was kept in the garage overnight preceding his death,” the commissioner said.
· Hart said investigators believe Thomas, as well as his 10-year-old brother, were subjected to punishment, including “food deprivation and exposure to extremely frigid temperatures.”
· “We are still investigating the extent of the abuse and if it extended to all of the children,” Hart said.
At the couple’s arraignment, Suffolk DA Timothy Sini revealed even more shocking details, describing “one of the worst crimes I’ve ever seen”, indicating the depravity of the couple’s actions while Thomas suffered a slow, agonizing death.
· The couple’s in-home security system had voice enabled camera’s in every room, including the children’s bedrooms.
· The garage camera was labeled as “Kids Room”, indicating it had indeed been used numerous times for punishments.
[Child’s voice] “Why can’t Thomas walk?”
[Pollino] “Because he’s hypothermic. When you’re washed with cold water and it’s freezing, you get hypothermia.”
[Pollino] “Do you know why he’s falling?”
[Valva] “Because he’s cold. Boo f–king hoo”
[Pollino] “What are you doing?”
[Valva] “Suffocating him; that’s what I’m doing”
[Pollino] “Get your hand off his mouth, there’s people everywhere.”
It was also revealed that Valva tried placing his (presumably dead) son in a warm bath to try and raise his body temperature before police arrived. They are due in court again on January 29th.
As more horrifying details of the child’s death emerged, the story became even more heartbreaking. Thomas’ mother, Justyna Zubko-Valva, a Polish émigré and Corrections Officer at Rikers, lost custody of Thomas and his two brothers during a bitter divorce and custody dispute. Identifying her son at the Medical Examiner was the first she had seen him in two years.Zubko-Valva’s Twitter and Facebook document years of her fight to save her boys, years of abuse by their father and his fiancée and a court and child welfare system that failed them. Even the boys’ school’s attempt to intervene on the boy’s behalf were ignored and deemed “unfounded”.
Justyna now has temporary custody of her two surviving sons.
ABOUT JUSTINA
“I am the mother of 3 little children (2 of the oldest have special needs) who were brutally, immediately, and without any reason taken away from me by the Judge from Nassau County Supreme Court who completely took away my right to defend myself and my children because I could not afford to hire a lawyer. I am an exemplary mother, never in conflict with the law, I have very responsible job. Since my children were born, I took wonderful care of them, attended all their educational, medical, and social needs. I submitted to the Court enormous amounts of 100% evidence (pictures, video recordings, voice recordings) regarding my husband’s abusive actions towards me and my children. One of the evidence shows how the father is forcing my children to repeat after him and Angela, the woman whom he lives with that: “mommy is mean”, “I don’t love mommy”, “mommy your are not nice”, “I am not proud of you mommy”, “You run away! You come back to the car!I don’t want to come home”, “I don’t want to stay with mommy”, “Don’t hit me mommy”, “mommy don’t touch me”, “I love mommy Angela”, “you run outside the house and you go find daddy”, “don’t hit me, don’t touch me, I want daddy”. My children were force to call the woman, who lives with their father, their mommy. My evidence also show father’s physical abuse towards our children after his visitations, where he is painfully squeezing and twisting my children hands when they are trying to get out from his hands and come to their mommy. The Judge Zimmerman did not take even into consideration my evidence regarding father’s addiction to hardcore pornography, where he was taking pictures, and videos of his private, intimate parts of his body and sending them to the women online, while putting our children to bed, and they were not sleeping yet. The father of my children does not have ANY evidence against me besides his false, empty accusations that I can easily disprove based on my evidence. I have text messages from my kids’ father who claims that he cannot control his anger, and that children for him are ONLY ADDITION to his life. He wanted the children to starve to death because he kept ignoring to pay financial support for them. The Judge Zimmerman for the past 2 years did not want to force the father to pay child support for our 3 children.
Judge Zimmerman, without any reason, treated me like the TERRORIST without ANY the ability to defend myself. My evidence in the case were not taken into consideration, and the Court kept rejecting submitted by me motions, even for temporary custody. The Judge Zimmerman deprived me from the ability to participate in the forensic evaluation with my children. She also issued VERBAL ORDER that cannot be appealed regarding my request to videotape the forensic evaluation, in which she did not agree for such evaluation to be video taped.
5 days before forensic evaluation she issued against me the FULL STAY ORDER OF PROTECTION, where she COMPLETELY DEPRIVED ME FROM ANY COMMUNICATION AND CONTACT WITH MY CHILDREN WHO ALSO HAVE SPECIAL NEEDS FOR 6 MONTHS. This order shows COMPLETE FAILURE TO THE JUSTICE SYSTEM, and it hurts me that Judge Zimmerman is ENORMOUSLY HURTING and DESTROYING the loving families, even little children with special needs!
Because of Judge Zimmerman, my children are going through the most traumatic experience of their lives that are causing tremendously negative changes in their development. My love towards my children, and their love towards me is unconditional, and every day without them is the most painful experience of my life. Everyone who knows me cannot believe that the Judge took the children away from an exemplary, loving mother, who always put her children on the first place in her life. My children, who also have special needs, are not safe living with their father, who cannot control his anger, and in the past, he also pointed gun at me. There is a report regarding this incident. Kids with special needs require patience and understanding that received from me throughout all their lives.
Please share my story with others in order to help my children to have contact with me, and come back to their mommy.”
Letters from Thomas’ school.
Another letter was also sent to CPS on behalf of Thomas’ older brother, also Autistic but lower functioning, indicating he was forced to sleep in the garage because he wet the bed and he was sent to school with his bookbag and clothes soaked in urine. The school asked Valva to remedy the issue numerous times but the boy still returned to school soaked with urine.
Mother’s Twitter posts documented the boys’ abuse, including audio recordings of Valva and Pollino “coaching” the boys to repeat false accusations against the mother and to say how much they loved daddy and Angela. The couple also coached Pollino’s daughters to bully the boys.
In an interview, after Thomas’ death, Zubko-Valva said “Every time I kept telling the judge, ‘if you’re not going to remove the children, they are going to die under his care and custody; There was evidence, hard evidence. Reports filed. Children were telling me too about the abuse.”
According to Justyna, Valva lied in court, presenting false allegations of abuse by her, including depriving them of food and leaving them out in the cold. Accusations, it now turns out, he and his fiancée are allegedly guilty of.Valva had legal representation, while Justyna represented herself. Additionally, the judge handling the case has a long track record of favoring lawyers who donated to her campaigns. Here are years of complaints against Judge Zimmerman (scroll down to bottom): http://www.therobingroom.com/NewYork/Judge.aspx?id=690&fbclid=IwAR2ALCbSQijuSFjWnBDjdmJBxyO3IMADjF6xVlyexN0D-7ASGnt7LMAmgu0
On Friday afternoon, Suffolk County Department of Social Services Commissioner Frances Pierre released the following statement regarding the family’s history with the agency:
“The Department of Social Services is heartbroken by the passing of Thomas Valva. Department personnel are continuing to provide all available information on this matter to law enforcement and will continue to cooperate fully throughout the investigation. Suffolk County Child Protective Services has had involvement with the Valva/Pollina family. Petitions for child neglect were filed in Suffolk County Family Court in 2018. Safeguards ordered to protect the children included court-ordered home supervision for a period of one year, Orders of Protection for the parents to refrain from harmful behaviors towards the children and mandated participation in a Positive Parenting Program had been put in place. Subsequent to the expiration of the order of protection, CPS investigated additional complaints relating to the family. DSS is formally reviewing the management of the case to ensure that all protocols were followed in accordance with the law. Due to confidentiality mandates and the nature of this ongoing investigation, the Department cannot comment further at this time.”
Michael Valva started a GoFundMe the day after Thomas’ death, to help with funeral costs. Reaching over $16k in donations, it was shut down after his arrest. A new GoFundMe has been started that will directly benefit Justyna and her surviving sons.
Valva has been suspended from the NYPD, without pay; he and Pollino are being held without bail and are scheduled to appear in 1st District court, Central Islip, on January 29th, 2020.
Their case will be presented to a Grand Jury.
All this information has been collected and written by group member Sharron. We are very grateful for all her hard work.
Links-https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2020/01/20/homicide-detectives-investigating-long-island-8-year-old-thomas-valva-death-in-driveway/
https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2020/01/24/father-arrested-in-boys-death/
https://www.facebook.com/StringerNewsService/posts/2765636290160066
This is the end of the original post, anything after this is updated information.
LI boy who froze to death had ‘road rash’ on face, like he was dragged, court docs say; funeral arrangements set
https://www.pix11.com/news/local-news/long-island/li-boy-who-froze-to-death-had-road-rash-on-face-like-he-was-dragged-court-docs-say-funeral-arrangements-set
Documents indicate Valva and his fiancée had a long history with Child Protective Services in Suffolk County and also reveal Michael Valva changed his story about the night of Jan. 16 into the early hours of Jan. 17.
EMT Lambert described the child’s condition and her interactions with Michael Valva, when 911 was called at 9:41 am on Jan. 17.
“The child was ice cold to the touch,” Lambert said. “Thomas wasn’t wearing underwear, or a shirt, and his sweat pants were pulled down to his knees.”
The respondent (meaning Michael Valva) told the EMT “….Thomas hit his head on the door frame and wet his pants.” According to the report, Valva then said “he gave the child a shower and put him on the couch” in the home’s finished basement.
The report said when Valva returned to check on the child, he was unresponsive.
“The EMT told respondent that the explanation was inconsistent with the severity of child’s injury. Respondent then changed his story, claiming Thomas Valva fell face first onto the driveway, as he was catching the school bus,” the report continued.
The report noted the boy had involuntarily defecated and “the child had additional abrasions to his knees, elbows, and right flank.”
The Family Court report also referenced an incident from more than two years ago, shortly after Michael Valva took over full-time custody of his three sons, in the home he lived in with Angela Pollina and her three daughters.
“On January 13, 2018, respondent became enraged with Thomas Valva and made the, then, 6-year-old child lean over a table with his hands stretched out and respondent repeatedly hit Thomas on the buttocks. This caused the child significant pain and numerous bruises,” with the report adding the boy had injury to his lower back “and was still in pain three days later.”
https://www.pix11.com/news/local-news/long-island/li-boy-who-froze-to-death-had-road-rash-on-face-like-he-was-dragged-court-docs-say-funeral-arrangements-set
“Thomas Valva was observed with visible abrasion to his face, like ‘road rash,’” EMT Erin Lambert told Suffolk County caseworkers, “which could have resulted by being dragged across pavement.”
The blog will be updated with information as it comes out but join the facebook group True Crime Society for all the latest- https://www.facebook.com/groups/TrueCrimeSociety/
Justina, you stay strong. I am finally getting to start over with my children (15 YEARS later!!!) due to parental alienation. It is the worst, most despicable thing allowed by the court w no repercussions.
This is a terrible but accurate example of how CORRUPT judges and the justice system are.